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BunceIsland

Sierra Leone

Slave Castles

AtlanticSlave Trade

North AmericanLinks

ProjectGoals

The
Ruins

VirtualArchaeology

Preservation
Efforts

Future of Bunce Island

BUNCE ISLAND is a British slave castle in the Republic of Sierra Leone in West Africa. Slave traders representing four British companies – all based in London – operated there successively between about 1670 and 1807, putting tens of thousands of African captives aboard slave ships bound for the West Indies and North America.

SIERRA LEONE is a small country on the coast of West Africa. A former British colony, it gained its independence in 1961. Freetown, the capital city, is located at the entrance to a great harbor, called the "Sierra Leone River." Bunce Island lies about 17 miles upriver from Freetown at the limit of navigation for large, ocean-going ships.

SLAVE CASTLES are the large fortified trading posts that European companies built along the coast of West Africa during the period of the Atlantic slave trade. There were about 40 major castles operated by companies based in Portugal, Holland, England, France, Sweden, Denmark, etc. Slave castles have been called "Warehouses of Humanity." The slave traders based there purchased African captives and held them until the slave ships came to transport them across the Atlantic to bondage in the Americas.

The ATLANTIC SLAVE TRADE was driven by the plantation economy in the Americas, especially the production of sugar, but also cotton, indigo, tobacco, coffee, rice, and other warm-weather crops that could not be grown in Europe. Between about 1500 and 1850, European slave traders put more than 11 million African captives aboard slave ships bound for Brazil, the West Indies, and North America. Many captives died on the terrible "middle passage, " the voyage between Africa and the New World.

NORTH AMERICAN LINKS made Bunce Island unusual in the Atlantic slave trade. Although only about 4% of the African captives taken across the Atlantic went to North America, Bunce Island had strong links to South Carolina and Georgia where rice was the staple crop. Farmers in Sierra Leone had been growing rice for centuries, and American rice planters paid premium prices for enslaved people from that area.

Our PROJECT GOALS begin with a computer reconstruction of Bunce Island as it appeared in 1805 when a British traveler, named Joseph Corry, made the last known period drawing of the castle. Corry's drawing is detailed, but inaccurate in many ways. By using the tools of virtual archaeology, though, we can see what Bunce Island really looked like in 1805, and add many realistic details, including people, ships, period artifacts, etc.

THE RUINS of Bunce Island are impressive. Many stone walls still stand – some up to 40 feet high – but others have collapsed, and the wooden features have long since decayed in Sierra Leone's tropical climate. The rate of disintegration of the ancient buildings is also increasing now due to industrial activity in the area. In 2008, the World Monuments Fund placed Bunce Island on its list of the world's most endangered historic sites.

VIRTUAL ARCHAEOLOGY uses 3-D computer graphics to visualize scientific data. Its most powerful tool is the 3-D reconstruction of ancient buildings and landscapes. Archaeologists can now create photo-realistic images of houses and entire settlements, showing them in naturalistic detail as they appeared centuries ago.

PRESERVATION EFFORTS have moved slowly at Bunce Island, but there have been some promising developments in recent years. Between 2010 and 2012, a research project brought in archaeologists, structural engineers, and materials scientists to survey the ruins. In 2012, UNESCO named Bunce Island a tentative World Heritage Site. The Sierra Leone Government is now working with experts to help preserve and interpret the castle.

The FUTURE OF BUNCE ISLAND will include the stabilization of the ruins, weather-proof outdoor displays, and a visitor's center. To assist that effort, our project will donate computer-generated stills and video of the castle as it appeared in 1805. Bunce Island's unique connection to North America means that once the site is preserved and interpreted, African Americans will be going there in large numbers every year.

Seeing the Atlantic Slave Trade

The Atlantic slave trade took place before the invention of photography, so in order to see places like Bunce Island and understand their terrible impact on the lives of millions, we must use the tools of virtual archaeology.

Move cursor on and off image to go back in time

Move cursor on and off image to go back in time

In the Footsteps of Thomas Clarkson

We are following in the footsteps of Thomas Clarkson, who led the movement against the slave trade in 18th century Britain. Clarkson developed a "broadside" (or poster) that showed 482 Africans packed aboard the slave ship Brooks. It became one of the best known images of the time, and no one who saw it could argue with its message – that the slave trade was utterly monstrous.

By using 21st century computers, we are helping make the Atlantic slave trade more real than ever before. Our goal is to reinforce the terrible lessons of the slave trade for those living today, and for the generations to come.

North American Connections

But Bunce Island was not just a slave trading base, it was unique among the major slave castles on the West African coast for its strong connections to North America.

Many of the captives sold at Bunce Island were taken to South Carolina and Georgia, where rice planters paid premium prices for slaves from Sierra Leone and neighboring areas where African farmers had grown rice for centuries.

Bunce Island was so well known to American planters as a source for captives with rice-growing skills that its name often appeared in slave auction adverts in Charleston and Savannah.

Bunce Island is the most important historic site in Africa for the United States. So, the more
we learn about Bunce Island, the more we learn about both African and American history. and

Sierra Leone is a small West African nation about
the size of South Carolina. A former British
colony, it gained its independence in 1961.

Sierra Leone’s capital city of Freetown is
located at the entrance to a great natural harbor
called the "Sierra Leone River." Freetown was
established in 1787 as a settlement for freed
slaves, but the great harbor and its islands had
been a hotbed of slave trading for centuries.

Bunce Island lies about 17 miles upriver from
Freetown in the upper reaches of the great harbor.
A tiny, finger-shaped island only about 1600 feet
long, it was strategically located at the limit of
deep water in the great harbor, the place where the
slave ships sailing upriver came to anchor.

Bunce Island was the center of commerce in
Sierra Leone for more than a century before Freetown
was established. Seeing the uninhabited island
today, Sierra Leoneans find it surprising that such
a tiny island could have such a long and terrible
history.

The Sierra Leone Government
is now looking for international support to help
preserve Bunce Island and transform it into a fully
interpreted historic site. When that happens, the
Bunce Island Virtual Archaeology Project will donate
the images it has created for the site's
interpretation.

Bunce Island

Photo by Vera Viditz-Ward

Bunce Island is a slave castle, one of the large
fortified trading posts European slave merchants
built on the coast of West Africa during the period
of the Atlantic slave trade.

British slave traders operated on Bunce Island
between about 1670 and 1807, putting about 30,000
African captives aboard slave ships bound for the
West Indies and North America.

While other slave castles shipped the vast majority
of their African captives to the West Indies, Bunce
Island sent slaves to both the West Indies and the
North American Colonies. Bunce Island’s commercial
ties to North America were strong enough that the
castle would actually figure in various ways in the
American Revolutionary War. For these reasons,
Bunce Island is arguably the most important historic
site in Africa for the United States.

Today, the Bunce Island castle lies in ruins. Many
of its walls have collapsed, and tropical vegetation
now covers the entire site. Without the work of
historians and archaeologists, it would be
impossible to know what Bunce Island looked like
when it last operated 200 years ago.

Slave Castles

European slave traders built about forty major slave
castles along the coast of West Africa. These
fortified trading posts – some resembling medieval
castles -- are scattered along a 3,000-mile stretch
of Atlantic coastline from Mauritania in the north
to Benin in the south.

Several European nations -- including Britain,
France, Holland, Denmark, and Sweden -- operated the
slave castles. European traders purchased African
captives at the castles, imprisoned them, and loaded
them aboard slave ships bound for the Americas. The
West African slave castles have been called
"Warehouses of Humanity."

Elmina Castle in Ghana is the largest of all the
slave castles. Established by the Portuguese in
1482, it was later seized by the Dutch, and later
still, by the English. Many African Americans visit
Elmina every year to learn what their ancestors
endured during the Atlantic slave trade.

But Bunce Island has a much stronger connection to
African Americans than Elmina and the other slave
castles in West Africa. While Elmina and the other
castles sent the vast majority of their captives to
the West Indies, Bunce Island had strong links to
both the West Indies and the North American
Colonies. No other slave castle is so strongly
connected to African Americans.

Virtual archaeology uses 3-D computer graphics to
visualize archaeological findings. Since
archaeologists uncover vast amounts of data from
their surface surveys and excavations, analyzing
these findings has always been difficult and
time-consuming. But computers are now making it
possible to see and understand archaeological data
in greater depth than ever before.

The most vivid tool of virtual archaeology is the
3-D reconstruction of ancient buildings and
landscapes. Using computer graphics and animation
archaeologists can now transform the data they
collect into photo-realistic images of houses,
forts, settlements, and even entire cities, showing
them in naturalistic detail as they existed hundreds
or thousands of years ago.

Virtual archaeology is particularly valuable for the
recreation of historic sites related to the Atlantic
slave trade. Unlike the Jewish holocaust and other
terrible events of the 20th century that should
never be forgotten, the Atlantic slave trade took
place before the invention of photography, and we
can only imagine its horrors based on written
accounts of the period. But virtual archaeology is
now making it possible to see the Atlantic slave
trade as it really was.

An African historian once called Bunce Island a
"Place Where History Sleeps." Virtual archaeology
is now waking Bunce Island from its long sleep, and
when Sierra Leoneans finally succeed at preserving
the castle and developing it as an historic site,
these computer-generated images will help visitors
understand the castle and its meaning for the modern
world.

Atlantic Slave Trade

Image from

European slave traders put about 12 million African
captives aboard slave ships bound for the New World
between about 1500 and 1850. Many captives died
during the terrible middle passage, the torturous
voyage across the Atlantic, and their bodies were
thrown overboard.

The Atlantic slave trade was based on the plantation
economy in the Americas. Sugar was the most
lucrative of all the plantation crops grown with
slave labor, and the slave trade was largely driven
by sugar production in tropical areas of the West
Indies and Northeastern Brazil. Sugar yielded vast
fortunes for American planters and for European
importers and ship owners.

Although the North American plantation crops –
tobacco, cotton, rice, and indigo – were also
valuable, they were nowhere near as valuable as
sugar, and only about 4% of the African captives
taken across the Atlantic went to what is now the
United States. Most African captives were taken to
the tropical sugar-growing areas in the Caribbean
and Brazil.

Bunce Island sent the majority its captives to the
Caribbean Basin, but it also sent many to North
America, and especially to the rice-growing colonies
of South Carolina and Georgia. African farmers in
Sierra Leone and other parts of the West African
"Rice Coast" had been growing rice for centuries,
and they were experts at its cultivation. South
Carolina and Georgia planters knew that the captives
brought from Bunce Island had the technical skills
they were looking for.

Project Goals

Image from

We are reconstructing Bunce Island as it appeared in
1805, the year a British traveler, named Joseph
Corry, made the last known period drawing of the
castle. Corry’s drawing is detailed, but it also
inaccurate in many respects, and by using the tools
of virtual archaeology we can show what Bunce Island
actually looked like when Corry visited it 200 years
ago.

The project directors are Joseph Opala, an historian
with 30 years’ experience studying Bunce Island’s
history and archaeology, and Gary Chatelain, a
specialist in Computer Assisted Design and the
history of interior design. Both are professors at
James Madison University in Virginia.

We are drawing on all the available historical
evidence for our reconstruction of Bunce Island,
including not just Corry’s 1805 drawing, but also
four other period drawings made during earlier
phases of the castle’s development. We are also
drawing on period documents describing the castle’s
architecture, and on detailed archaeological studies
of the ruins.

Since the project began in 2004, we have
reconstructed the island itself, the slave castle
and its buildings, and the African village that lay
outside the walls of the castle. But this is a work
in progress. We are now beginning to recreate the
interiors of the castle’s rooms by adding period
furnishing and artifacts, and we will ultimately add
human figures, including the British slave traders
and their African workers in period dress, and the
captives locked in the slave prisons.

Our ultimate goal is to represent Bunce Island
during the period of the Atlantic slave trade so
accurately and in as such great visual detail that
people today can see the Atlantic slave trade for
themselves and understand its terrible impact on the
lives of millions.